The John Batchelor Show

Thursday 11 January 2017

Air Date: 
January 11, 2018

Photo, left: Qatar Airlines Dreamliner
 
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-hosts: Mary Kissel, Wall Street Journal Editorial Board & host of Opinion Journal on WSJ Video. Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents.
 
Hour One
Mike Doran. Michael Rubin. Jonathan Schanzer. 
 
Hour Two
Dr. R. Seetharaman. Dr. R. Seetharaman, Group CEO of Doha Bank. H.H. Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, foreign minister of Qatar.
 
 
Hour Three
H.E. Akbar Al Baker, group CEO, Qatar Airways. H.E. Hassan al-Thawadi, Secretary General of the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy and director of Qatar’s 2022 World Cup committee.
 
 
Hour Four
Bob Zimmerman BehindtheBlack.com. David Crist.
._________________________________________
 
 
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-hosts: Mary Kissel, Wall Street Journal, and Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents; Christopher Nixon Cox, OC Partners
 
Hour One
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 1, Block A:  Malcolm Hoenlein, Mary Kissel, Chris Cox and John Batchelor, in re: Doha has the largest US air base outside of the US – 11,000 troops, serves Iraq, Afghanistan and _____.   . . . Breakdown of the GCC.  Secy Tillerson visited Qatar looking for a way to arbitrate; 58 months and nine days till the World Cup begins. . . .
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 1, Block B: Mike Doran, Hudson Institute,  in re: Iran, Iran in Syria. Some say, “This is not the time to undo the Iran deal.” What that means is change the terms while keeping the deal.  If Pres Trump were simply to scrap the deal outright, look at who’s arrayed against him: Mattis, Tillerson most Dems in Congress, some GOP, zero Europeans much of re US press, and he Chinese, Russians, Iranians, etc.  The deal is an abomination and I’d like to see it go away, but scrapping it summarily wd be an escalation in the conflict with Iran.  Our No 1 priority is to articulate clearly what's wrong with the deal, how we thin it needs to be changed, and lay out the ground clearly, rationally and reasonably. A question of sequencing: US law, if Iran doesn't abide by the terms permanently we’ll reimpose the sanctions. Step 1: unify Dems and OGOP on what’s wrong with the deal; 2, engage our allies and the rest of the world.
·         https://www.hudson.org/research/14104-don-t-end-the-iran-deal-fix-it
·         https://www.voanews.com/a/us-house-cheers-iran-protests-condemns-human-rights-violations/4200675.html
·         https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/01/09/trump-iran-reagan-sanctions-history-216261
Michael Doran is a Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC. He specializes in Middle East security issues.  In the administration of President George W. Bush, Doran served in the White House as a senior director in the National Security Council, where he was responsible for helping to devise and coordinate United States strategies on a variety of Middle East issues, including Arab-Israeli relations and U.S. efforts to contain Iran and Syria. He also served in the Bush administration as a senior advisor in the State Department and a deputy assistant secretary of defense in the Pentagon.
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 1, Block C: Michael Rubin, author, in re: Kurds; & Iran. The situation in Iraq is stabilized; jockeying in advance of the spring elections.  Protests in Iraqi Kurdistan because so much money has been unpaid and has disappeared; but Baghdad has said it’ll pay civil servants as soon as the audits are done.  Mahsoud Barzani stepped down in name but not reality. Kurds sold a lot of their oil interests in advance for cash payments; some co’s thereby get to take X Bbls of oil, but the oil fields around Kirkuk were taken by Baghdad, so Kurds have a loan shark situation. Kurds have always been hopelessly divided – Syria, Turkey, Iran. Still, there’s somc optimism there right now.   The good-cop/bad-cop dynamic is without legs; it’s not reformers or hardliners who control; rather, control is by Iran.  The Supreme Leader has had cancer; when he leaves, celebrations will break out. 
The internecine disagreements are like the Jewish Liberation Front vs. the Liberation Front of the People of Judea.  The best chance for Kurds to achieve independence will be when the Islamic Republic dissolves.
Qassem Soleimani: he’s both prowling the area and gone on to other troubles. Just because he’s shown up somewhere. he might be there for a photo op and be trying to look as though he’s in charge. Everywhere he appears is where Iran thinks is important. He may be entitled as head of the Quds Corps, but he’s really the foreign Minister.  Not the ever-photographed Jared Zarif.
Ankara summoned a senior US diplo. The most effective fighting force vs ISIS and al Q were the Syrian Kurds, but both Turkey and the US call them terrorists.  As Turkey switched from US to Russia to China to Russia, no one trusts Erdogan.
US wants Assad and Russians not to offer sovereignty or something in order to spilt the US from Kurds. We refuse to let Kurdish leadership visit US, but Russia invites them; the US lacks a coherent strategy.
I’m a big fan of federalism, and it’ll reverberate throughout the world. I was in Syrian Kurdistan and was highly impressed by their organization and fighting force.  Local rule and people having liberty: US needs to support these the world over.
When I ended my last trip to Iraq was the first time I’ve been optimistic. Iran has long been the most brutal regime and the Kurds won't forget it.
·         http://www.aei.org/publication/968232/
·         http://www.rudaw.net/english/interview/10012018
·         https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjR0vbA0NDYAhUxkeAKHbZ7CMkQqUMIODAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thetimes.co.uk%2Farticle%2Ftur key-summons-us-diplomat-over-kurdish-training-programme-g5btw0dzj&usg=AOvVaw1uFJubgsVE3v7Rav8OtwRb
·         https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2017/12/iraq-kurdistan-baghdad-referendum.html
Michael Rubin is a former Pentagon official whose major research areas are the Middle East, Turkey, Iran and diplomacy. Rubin instructs senior military officers deploying to the Middle East and Afghanistan on regional politics, and teaches classes regarding Iran, terrorism, and Arab politics on board deploying U.S. aircraft carriers. Rubin has lived in post-revolution Iran, Yemen, both pre- and post-war Iraq, and spent time with the Taliban before 9/11. His newest book, Dancing with the Devil: The Perils of Engaging Rogue Regimes examines a half-century of U.S. diplomacy with rogue regimes and terrorist groups.
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 1, Block D: Jonathan Schanzer, FDD, in re:  Iran sanctions. The demonstrations complain about how Teheran has spent public funds, incl, terrorism and nukes.  Turkish banker, Reza Zarrab, in New York court for having stolen and pass vast sums to Iran.  Yielded Iran $100 Bil at the height of the nuclear standoff.   . . .
Do White House and Treasury sanctions matter? Yes, in that the Iranian people are very angry at how the regime has wasted public funds.  Sanctions shed a light on [malfeasance}, which will resonate in the street. Abt $16 Bil per year has gone to rogue states, alone. Iran will always try to step in – and we need to let them understand that they, too, can be the objects of sanctions. Hoft [?]  Bank will rcv a hefty fine; BNP Paribas did. Send a tough message to those who consider evincing bad behavior in future.
“Mehmet Hakan Atilla, a Turkish banker, has been found guilty of bank fraud and conspiracy due to his involvement in a plot to help Iran . . .”
·         http://www.defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/david-adesnik-iran-spends-16-billion-annually-to-support-terrorists-and-rogue-regimes/
·         http://www.defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/schanzer-jonathan-the-biggest-sanctions-evasion-scheme-in-recent-history/
Since joining us in February 2010, Dr. Schanzer has been singularly focused on ensuring that FDD delivers not only accurate and timely research, but also research that is useful to decision makers inside the Beltway, across America, and around the world. He worked as a terrorism finance analyst at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, where he played an integral role in the designation of numerous terrorist financiers.  A former research fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Dr. Schanzer has studied Middle East history in four countries. Dr. Schanzer is part of the leadership team of FDD’s Center on Sanctions and Illicit Finance
 
Hour Two
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 2, Block A:  Dr. Raghavan Seetharaman, Group CEO of Doha Bank  (part 1 of 2)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 2, Block B:  Dr. Raghavan Seetharaman, Group CEO of Doha Bank  (part 2 of 2)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 2, Block C:  H.H. Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatari foreign minister  (part 1 of 2)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 2, Block D:  H.H. Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatari foreign minister  (part 2 of 2)
 
Hour Three
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 3, Block A:  H. E. Akbar Al Baker, CEO of Qatar Airways  (part 1 of 2)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 3, Block B:  H. E. Akbar Al Baker, CEO of Qatar Airways  (part 2 of 2)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 3, Block C:  Hassan al-Thawadi,  Secretary General of the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy and director of Qatar’s 2022 World Cup committee (part 1 of 2).
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 3, Block D:  Hassan al-Thawadi,  Secretary General of the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy and director of Qatar’s 2022 World Cup committee (part 2 of 2).
 
Hour Four
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 4, Block A: Assassins of the Turquoise Palace, by Roya Hakakian (part I of II)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 4, Block B: Assassins of the Turquoise Palace, by Roya Hakakian (part I of II)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 4, Block C:  David Crist, The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran (part II of II)
Thursday  11 January 2018 / Hour 4, Block D:  David Crist, The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran (part II of II)
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